


Reading Out Loud

by trace_of_scarlet



Category: Marvel (Comics), Marvel (Movies), Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Runaways (Comics)
Genre: Crossover, Friendship, Gen, Male-Female Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-22
Updated: 2013-03-22
Packaged: 2017-12-06 03:54:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/731190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trace_of_scarlet/pseuds/trace_of_scarlet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone needs a story when they're having a really bad day... Although sometimes it's more about having someone there to tell it to you.</p><p>(Or, Molly reads the Hulk a bedtime story.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reading Out Loud

**Author's Note:**

> Set in Milliways Bar, although you don't have to know the setting to understand the fic. Quotes are by JK Rowling and A.A. Milne, and if you can't tell which is which then I am _really_ concerned.

There is a lull as Molly closes the book, as if she stood - or, well, sat - at the eye of the storm. And then the Hulk roars and it's like a bomb blast, as if everything capable of screaming is roaring all at once, as if everything - sound, time, her thoughts, her breathing - has fled, is lost in the absolute _noise_ of him.

And then it stops, and through the ringing quiet the Hulk looks at her green-eyed and uncomprehending that she hasn't run, that she still won't run.

"I always hate it when that book ends, too," she says placidly, shifting position so that instead of swinging her legs she's sitting comfortably cross-legged on the office desk. "Even though the dementors used to totally freak me out."

The Hulk makes this weird little sound, sort of confused and sort of enquiring, and for a moment she can almost kind of see Bruce there again, like he's trapped and wants out just as much as the Hulk wants out of his unbreakable cell. (She used to think there were dementors under her bed, until she realised that the real world had way scarier things in it.)

"It's alright to freak out," she tells him, because maybe Bruce can hear her and even if he can't, the Hulk can. "I wouldn't like being put in a box either. But I'm not gonna leave, okay? So you don't have to be scared, 'cause you're not on your own."

If you asked her which of them she was speaking to right now she couldn't tell you, because it's true for either of them - it's not like the Hulk really seems like a bad person (he's still basically Bruce, after all), he just freaks out easy, like how Gert always gets angry and shouts when she's panicking. And maybe he wouldn't flip out so bad if people didn't always either run away or try to hurt him.

"If you're good and stop yelling so much, I'll go get you cake," she promises. "When you go back to being Bruce again, anyway. But really you can make all the noise you want, 'cause you can't scare me."

The Hulk stares down at her and she looks straight back up at him, her own eyes tired but just as green. It's like the weirdest stand-off she's ever been in, and she might only be thirteen-and-three-quarters but that's still seriously saying something. She doesn't know what it is that does the trick, but eventually the Big Guy seems to give in or give up or settle down or whatever, crashing like an earthquake into a seated position on the floor of his cell - although she'd be the most surprised mutant _ever_ if he stayed that way for very long.

"Good boy," she says encouragingly, and takes a slurp of her milkshake before picking up a new book to read. " _Order of the Phoenix_ is way creepier than the earlier books, 'cause it's got Professor Umbridge in it and she's, like, the most horrible _ever_ and she's really mean to people she thinks are freaks like me. And you probably don't need to wig out any more than you have already, so I guess this might work instead, 'cause my mom always read it to me when I'd had a nightmare, and it always used to help me sleep."

The Hulk grunts, which probably counts as agreement, so she pushes back one floppy pink ear of her hat and smoothes out the first page of her book.

"Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin..."


End file.
